A DEARTH OF FLAVOR AT SABUR

Ah finally. I am done blogging about my European adventure. Of course, it took me 3 weeks to finish blogging, which means I'm now 3 weeks behind on everything else! I actually thought of posting this review right after I had dinner at Sabur. Just because I wanted to warn the rest of you not to go there. But I never got around to it and honestly, I don't think any of you guys would have found your way over there during the last 3 weeks.

So the day after I returned from Europe, we (Tom, Leah and I) had dinner with Sue Min at Sabur. We were looking for something new to try and I'd heard that Sabur, located in Somerville, was a good place, plus I had checked out their menu online and it looked quite appealing.

We should've taken the completely empty dining room as an omen of the meal we were about to have. But I think I brushed it off, blaming it on the fact that it was a weeknight and the location of the restaurant. And as we perused the menu and waited for Sue Min, I was still hopeful for our meal. So we started off by sharing some hummus and pita. It was pretty good, though I like the hummus at the Red Fez more.So the first bad sign was when one member of the weight staff dropped a piece of silverware. Rather than picking it up, they decided to kick it (noisly) over the stone floor to the back kitchen. Hmmmm....

I ordered the Roasted Garlic Polenta, Wood Grilled Artichokes, Tomato & Olives. Sounds great huh? Here it is below. The polenta was completely tasteless. And not all that warm. It'd clearly been prepared way in advance and just reheated. I didn't detect any roasted garlic and concluded that I made much better polenta than this, and my polenta didn't cost $15 per serving.Leah ordered the Pan Roasted Tilapia with Grilled Artichokes, Tomatoes & Cured Olives; Served over Soft Polenta as her entree.I had actually thought of getting this myself. And turns out we'd basically ordered the same dish anyway, but hers just had a serving of overcooked fish served on the same tasteless polenta that I had ordered, and covered with tomato sauce.

I think Tom had better luck with his Beef Sirloin with Gorgonzola Walnut Cream and Garlic Potato which he said was pretty goodAnd to be quite honest, I have no recollection of what Sue Min ordered, but I'm sure it was just a nonmemorable as the rest of our dinners had been.The service here was also quite bad. You'd think that the restaurant being nearly empty would lead to some greater attention, but you'd be wrong in thinking that. Our waitress wasn't very helpful at all, and seemed to come by to check on us more out of obligation than genuinely caring about how we were doing.

In conclusion, avoid Sabur. Or any restaurant that refers to itself as offering Exotic Mediterranean cuisine. I would've preferred plain, boring Mediterranean cuisine. At least it would've tasted better than the food at Sabur.